Variable
by Niahara Erskine
Summary: Upon starting his quest to create a new world, Kira planned everything to the last step in order to ensure his success. However, she was the variable in his plan. He hadn’t known about her existence, until it was too late to counter her moves. MelloXOC
1. Prologue

_**A/N Ok so this idea just popped in my head today and I was thinking to let you guys decide what you think about it. I'd like to continue it, if people find the beginning interesting enough. If the story shall be continued it won't have more than five or six chapters just to let you know. So, please review and let me know your opinion. As stated before English is not my native language so I may have mistakes here and there. Also, I do not own anything… would I be writing on fanfiction if I did?**_

_**Summary: Upon starting his quest to create a new world, Kira planned everything to the last step in order to ensure his success. However, she was the variable in his plan. He hadn't known about her existence, until it was too late to counter her moves.**_

_**Rating: T**_

_**Pairings: Friendship MelloXNear, MattXMello, maybe MelloXOC in later chapters.**_

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Standing near the window, watching the other children play outside in the yard, the girl started thinking about her first memories. She couldn't remember much of what had happened before she came to Wammy's. After all she had been but five years old at the time; she often recalled warm hugs and a lullaby being sung to her at night, the smell of peppermint that accompanied a certain man from her past, who she supposed, was her father and a red blanket being dropped over her semi-sleeping form at night by a woman with a gentle touch who must have been her mother. And then there was that day when she lost everything: she recalled herself wearing a frilly, blue dress as she was led by the hand by her mother towards her father's car. She stopped near the entrence of the garden and her mother went a little ahead beckoning the little girl to follow her. She felt, although it wasn't truly a memory that they had been happy that day, that something exciting was bound to happen. Her father was already at the wheel and her mother had just stepped in the car. She was unsure whether to leave the safety of the garden and follow her mother in. She made baby steps towards the car, but something she had been holding fell and she turned around to pick it up. Her father had just started the engine… all she remembered afterwards was the noise, a loud, deafening noise and the heat, the flames that hurt her back. She fell and cried out in pain… everything else is a blur.

Parts of her mind seem to recall white walls and a continuous beeping, a white bed upon which she lay and kind faces trying to determine whether she was all right or not. Although just three, she knew she was not ok… she had always been a highly perceptive child. Mother and father were most likely gone and the girl knew she had no one else. The two had been the only presences in her life for the first three years of her life… now they were there no longer. She never talked with them… thinking back now she presumed that most likely the doctors though she had been either too traumatized or brain damaged by the explosion. They probably never understood that she didn't want to speak… there was no one there to understand her.

From the white room with a white bed she had been moved, after her burns had healed, to a different room, a dull grey one with a metal bed and a shabby desk. The room of an orphanage… she hadn't remained there long; due to lack of money they had closed the facility down and she had found herself sent to an asylum as she never talked and scared people with her emotionless gazes. The girl couldn't remember at all her time there as she had been given medicine in order to treat her trauma. She spent two years there… she hadn't understood her feelings at that time, however now she knew she had hated that place.

One day everything had changed… it started out normally. She woke up, took her pills and scribbled something on her notebook. The only good thing that had happened at the asylum was that she had learned how to write and had been spending some time creating imaginary works on her notebook that she had later ripped and hid under her mattress so no one would be able to find them.

She looked outside the window; the gloomy weather had brought with itself a visitor. Not many people visited that God forsaken place since most patients had no families to rely on so seeing a new face was an interesting thing. She sighed and continued staring out the window long after the man entered the building; it wasn't like he was going to visit her, nobody knew who she was anymore or where she had come from. So she had been surprised when she had seen the man enter her room about a quarter an hour late. He was relatively old as far as she could tell, a thick mustache adorning his face and his eyes hidden behind a pair of oval glasses. He was dressed smartly, in a suit, with a dark coat resting on his shoulders; the girl was surprised to see such a man in her room smiling gently at her.

"Hello, little one. My name is Watari. Somehow I do not believe you belong here, young lady." He said getting straight to the point; the girl watched him in confusion, her dark blue eyes widening ever so slightly. "Your caretakers" she would have snorted had she not controlled herself. Caretakers indeed! " have told me that you do not speak with anyone. However, maybe you do not have anything to share with them, am I right?" A soft smile made its way on her lips and she nodded her head. "Do you remember anything from your past? Your name, your family?"

She shook her head… her gesture could be seen either as a negative response or as an answer among the lines: I do not wish to remember. She grabbed her notebook and scribbled down:

"My past died! I have nothing to remember." Her handwriting was childish and immature, but her thoughts precise.

"I understand." the man said "I'm here, because as I said, I do not believe you belong here. An child who writes so elaborately at the age of five shouldn't be locked up in an asylum. I would like to offer to take you away from this place, to bring you to a place where you can live and learn. A house for gifted children."

She gazed at him unsure what to think… here was an adult who was offering her a better place. Why? What would he gain from that? She decided she didn't really need to know the answer. Ever since he had entered the room, she had felt a warm feeling surround her. In the end all she wanted was to get away from that place, so she listened to her instincts: she nodded and he smiled again at her…

"Very well. I'll make sure to get the paperwork done."

A few days late she made her first steps into an old Victorian house from Winchester, England and her new life began. She had been five years and a half then.

She quickly noticed the difference between this orphanage and the other one where she had spent a short period of time; this one was bright and clean. It had a nice playground outside and children were laughing. Gone were the brown spots from the dull grey walls and the weeping children who had no place to go.

Watari took her hand and led her to what was going to be her new room; it wasn't fancy, but it felt warm. The girl couldn't explain her feelings, but upon seeing the square, oak desk near the window, the bed with snow white sheets and the light blue walls she felt at ease. She set her small bag with the few clothes she had on the floor and jumped on the bed, her small feet dangling in the air. A red ribbon, the only remembrance of her past life, was twirling around her small fingers as she took everything into account.

"This is going to be your new home." Watari smiled at her "When joining Wammy's children let their pasts behind them and start anew. They are also given a new name and a letter. Your letter shall be K;you may think of a name for yourself or one can be picked for you."

The girl's blue orbs stared at the man; find a name for herself, just like that? For the past two years she hadn't had a name except "the child" and "the girl" so being addressed somehow would be a nice change. Remembering a small fragment from her dead past she jumped off the bed and grabbed her notebook from her bag, scribbling something in a messy handwriting then showed it to Watari. A single word lay on the paper:

_**KEIRA**_

"With a K?" the girl nodded "Very well, it is an interesting name. I will let you settle down." Watari smiled and left her alone in her room.

Ten years had passed since; she had learned that Wammy's was a place where they trained children to become successors for the century's greatest detective, L. She found out that all children there were smart, but only the first two really had a chance to win the title.

During those ten years she had decided never to look back on her life before Wammy's. As she was standing next to the window and glancing outside, she started wandering what exactly made her break that particular vow.


	2. Bonding

_**A/N: Ok although I only got one alert, I'll give it a try see how it turns up. As usual I do not own anything. Please RXR ^^ Constructive criticism is always luff :D**_

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Chapter I: Bonding

Perched on the window, Keira thought for a moment about going outside to join the other children in the playground. She could jump on the swings and pretend she was flying, like she had done many times after joining Wammy's House, then as she would get higher and higher she would dream herself to be in one of her made up stories. However, she shook her head and disregarded the idea… she preferred to remain in her room, continuing to remember her past as she hadn't done before.

She had been the odd one out from the very beginning, being considered strange even by the Wammy standards. Firstly, she never talked… she had kept that habit she had developed in hospital and not one sound escaped her lips. Many children tried to coax her into playing games with them, hoping that she would open up to them, but she never did… so in time they gave up. Secondly, she liked to keep to herself and play with her red ribbon or write instead of joining the others outside. She would sometimes sit on the window, with one leg tucked under her and one left dangling in the air and gaze at her surroundings without really taking anything into account.

The truth was she didn't want company… even though orphans, most children from Wammy had an aura of happiness surrounding them, as though there was no darkness in their past. Keira wasn't happy… she was at most content. Having had a harsher past then most children, the girl was unsure whether she knew how to be happy anymore. So she kept to herself and hid from the others' cheerful attitude… she had been alone.

Suddenly an angry shout snapped her out of her musings; she instantly recognized the voice.

"I'm going to kill you Matt! Give me back my chocolate!" even though angry it was clear from the person's voice that he wouldn't follow with his threat.

"No way, Mels! This is payback for getting me into trouble with Roger yesterday."

"Why you little!!!"

Keira allowed a little smile to make its way on her lips. She could imagine their chase: a red haired boy with yellow goggles hiding his blue eyes behind them, wearing a stripped red and black shirt and blue jeans being followed by a rabid blonde haired teen with chocolate colored eyes dressed in black and bearing an angry expression on his face. At one point Matt would slow down allowing Mello to catch him, or the second would quicken his face and they would both trip over one another and fall in a tangled mess laughing like maniacs. At the same time, in a different room of the orphanage, not far away from Keira's a white haired boy dressed in pyjamas would be building an intricate building out of dice and would most likely glare, unseen by others, when his building would tremble due to the ruckus the first two had caused.

Yes, Keira had been alone… until those three came along and she had seen something in them that pushed her to try and befriend them. Matt had been the first of the three to arrive at Wammy's at the age of six. She had been ten at the time and had already created a reputation of being shy and solitary. She spotted him as soon as he stepped out of the car walking next to Watari towards the building… from her spot by the window she noticed something at the boy: he was scared, she could see his body tremble ever so slightly and his fingers fidget over the video game he was holding tightly in his hands. None of the children who had previously arrived at Wammy's had been scared: sad, melancholic, calm or curious, yes, but never scared. Matt had tried to hide his feelings behind a confident smirk and a steady pace… that's what drew Keira to making contact to him: his confidence and his strength.

She had never asked what happened before he came to the orphanage, none of them did. It was an unspoken rule between the four never to ask about each other's pasts… they knew they weren't going to hear anything nice.

The next to arrive at Wammy's was the white haired boy, Near. Keira had missed his arrival, but her peers had started gossiping about the pale boy enough to catch her attention. At that time she was thirteen and Near was ten. The other children said he was weird, that he kept to himself and stared at the others with round, dark eyes as if searching their very souls and that he had a funny way of sitting with one leg folded by his side and the other pulled to his chest. As soon as she finished her classes Keira had crept silently to the new boy's room, trying to figure out whether he would be worth her attention or not. She found him sitting in his dim-lit room, a couple of steps from her very own, recreating what seemed to be a medieval castle from dice. She kept herself in the shadows, silent as a grave so that she wouldn't be noticed. She supposed she had to admit, the new boy was strange, but not in a bad way, rather in a pelicular one. His dark eyes shone with intelligence and Keira knew from that very moment that she would be unable to compete with him; however his face was an emotionless mask. She smiled and nodded to herself; then quietly crept in his room and sat on the floor watching him build the castle. He ignored her in the beginning and did not acknowledge her presence till her small fingers stopped him from adding a dice that would have sent the construction crashing into pieces.

"What do you want." He asked plainly

Keira took her notebook and pen from her pocket and wrote down.

"The building will fall if you add that dice. Try building a pillar first." She gave him the note and nodded.

"Very well. Thank you…"

"Keira." She wrote again.

"Keira. My name is Near."

Keira liked Matt and she looked up to Near. However it was Mello who she admired. The blonde had come like a tempest at the orphanage yelling in rage and trashing around, disturbing Keira's little harmony. She had scowled fiercely then… she may had been only third in succeeding L at that moment, but everyone knew not to go around yelling and screaming like the new boy did. It annoyed her to no end… She rose from her bed, tossed the book she had been reading behind her and grabbed a small blue ball, her only toy then marched towards his room. She hadn't expressed any emotions in a long time so being irritated was almost new to her. She found him on the bed throwing yet another temper tantrum over some petty reason. She aimed the ball at his head, threw it and once it reached its target, grinned triumphantly then left the room ignoring his indignant yells of:

"Oi! What the hell was that?!"

Keira returned to her room and jumped on her bed, slowly calming down and returning to her normal state. That until the blonde haired boy stormed in her room yelling once more:

"What the hell do you think you're doing throwing things at people's heads you loon?"

She grabbed her notebook and furiously wrote down.

"Stop yelling you silly boy! It gives me a headache!." She threw the paper at him and he caught it in one swift movement.

"Boy? What do you think you are a freaking adult?" he snarled

"I'm thirteen and you're only an immature eleven year old!" she wrote again and pounded annoyed.

After reading the piece of paper, he looked at her with one eyebrow raised and started laughing.

" I'm almost twelve… Ya know, for acting so high and mighty you look like a damn five year old pounding like that. It's freaking hilarious." Her scowl turned into a look of surprise as she wondered how come he could switch from one emotion to another so easily.

Yes, Keira admired Mello… although he was rash, immature and hot-tempered, he could do something the girl hadn't been able to do in a long time: show his emotions without constrain and without fear. For that she held the boy in the highest regard.

Suddenly a loud thud could be heard in the girl's room and a tangle of arms and legs fell through her cracked door, just as she predicted they would do.

"Hi, K! Sorry to bump in your room in such a fashion!" Matt displayed his devil-may-care grin from somewhere under a mass of black clothes. "Get off me you doof." He tried to shove Mello aside.

"Neah, I don't think so. I'm quite comfortable here." He grinned "Heya Keira! Do you happen to have a bar of chocolate hidden somewhere?"

The girl nodded and grabbed a bar of dark chocolate from her desk then threw it at Mello. Suddenly, a young boy she vaguely knew as Robert stopped near her room and looked weirdly at the tangled mess made of Mello and Matt.

"Mello, Roger wants to see you in his office. Alone…"

Keira knew that instant something was wrong. She could feel it…


End file.
